Don’t scrap rules to allow development

State legislators called for exempting state and county construction projects from the standard environmental review process early in the session because of the economic recession. They now are going forward with the plan, although the state’s economy is improving and the Abercrombie administration is sending conflicting signals on the issue. Lawmakers instead should shelve the proposal, realizing that such drastic action is unwarranted given the tradeoff harm to environmental safeguards.

One measure, Senate Bill 755, sought to allow the governor and mayors to create lists of public projects for exemption from the assessment process that determines whether full-scale environmental impact statements are required. It was amended Thursday to give only the governor this power, for projects approved through June 2015.

Also removed was an inexplicable provision that would have put the state Office of Planning (OP) in charge of special management area permits for state projects and state shoreline setback variance requests.

As it should, that idea alarmed even OP, which fretted: "This would set OP up for failure, risk federal funding, detract from the effectiveness of the Coastal Zone Management Program to plan for and manage the sustainable use of Hawaii’s coastal resources, and raise the specter of liability for OP and the state."

Last week’s fixes, though, served to keep the bill alive, when it should be shelved.

Lawmakers’ obvious frustration with red tape provides an opportunity to get to the heart of the matter, rather than make exemptions that might invite favoritism or other detriments. There has been recent talk about streamlining the process and eliminating complexities in the procurement code and the protest area. That approach is welcome if it preserves an open, competitive process.

Another disconcerting aspect of this debate is that the Abercrombie administration’s policy is emerging as confused, with state directors opposing each other in legislative testimony.

The state Department of Transportation supports authorizing Abercrombie "to exempt certain state projects from several duplicative permitting require- ments" to allow various transportation projects "to be expeditiously completed and help to promote economic revitalization."

But that is from one voice of the administration. Another, from Gary Hooser, who is Abercrombie’s director of the Office of Environmental Quality Control, complained to House committees that the bill would exempt a "wide range" of projects from environmental review and "other important public interest safeguards."

Hooser testified, "Scrapping the current structure that ensures thoughtful review, complete transparency and opportunity for public input in exchange for a unilateral process that includes no public input, no transparency and no system of thoughtful impartial review sets a very bad precedent, provides a separate set of rules for public and private projects."

We concur.

Joining in opposition to the bill is the state Office of Hawaiian Affairs.

"Without any showing of correlation, the proposed bill appears to suggest that state and county oversight are somehow preventing economic recovery through state and county project expenditures," OHA testified. "Although this bill may be touted as a means of promoting economic recovery, the consequences of poor planning remain the same, regardless of the state’s economic state, and could result in irreversible impacts or costly remediation measures in the future."

The bill’s earlier versions were drafted to launch state and county projects and help boost what was a struggling construction industry. However, economic forecasters at the University of Hawaii are cautiously predicting an improvement in the state’s construction industry this year. And the state Council on Revenues has upgraded its forecast for revenue growth.

This legislation that would give the governor broad power in exempting projects from environmental review continues to alarm. The regulatory process that protects Hawaii’s delicate environment should not be abandoned because of economic conditions that look to be left behind — or for misguided "fixes" that might actually mire projects even further.